Yesterday I was staring at the 10 tog duvet in disbelief because I was contemplating swapping it with the 4 tog lightweight thing I’ve been using this summer. Where has the year gone?! Tomorrow, I’ve been told it’s going to hit 29 degrees in London, it looks like we’re going to have our whole Indian summer in a prim 24 hour period before it makes a swift exit. But more than that I’m aghast at the speed the year’s flown by.

How was your summer? Do you feel as if you’ve had one?

This is a shortie, just like my hair is right now.

I had about a foot of it cut off at the start of July.

A few hours before the shearing..

And it felt fantastically liberating to be honest. I was chuffed, chuffed, chuffed with the result. I had this intense Iraqi stylist tackle it with a rare confidence after examining the four photos I showed her on my mobile, nodding her head and then get cracking. I’ve started running recently and it feels REALLY good feeling the wind on my neck when I move. Just lovely. The only drag is that I know it’s going to really cost me to keep it this length. In the past I’ve been guilty of letting it go unattended for a year at a time. It’s only been six weeks and I’m already itching for a trim! I’m amazed at how versatile short hair is. It’s a graduated bob, gets shorter towards the back, so it can look quite fierce which makes me feel equally so, but then i can also go for sleek ala the shot above. Promise the below is the last vain glorious shot, I’ve not had such short hair since 1998 so it’s a big thrill for me to be honest.

grrrr

The summer has been hectic, I’ve had an overhaul on the inside and out AND in The Castle and have also squeezed in some writing, a lot of study, as well as reading some great books: ‘The Girls‘ by Lisa Jewell was my most compulsive read of the year. The kind that hijacks your agenda for the day. I posted a snap of myself on Lisa’s Facebook clad in a Cath Kidston floral towel clutching my copy, as the postman had got me out of my candle lit bath to deliver it! It was worth the interruption 😉 My biggest slow burner but most rewarding read has to be Antipodean author Kate Forsyth’s The Wild Girl. Her writing is beautiful. I want to get a copy of Bitter Greens.

If you ever want to talk books with 4000+ enthusiastic souls come find us here on Facebook at The Bookshop Cafe. It’s my baby and I’m really proud of how positive our members are about their experience of it.

And in other News, because I honestly didn’t just come back to blog about my haircut, though you could be forgiven for thinking I had, in light of me posting three selfies featuring it, I kicked off a FANTASTIC month of posts for Rivka Spicer’s Diversity Month.

The blog posts have been generating a LOT of interest and discussion. I was very flattered and privileged to be chosen as the launch author by Rivka, who has a great ethos in embracing diversity in its every permutation. You can read my post HERE. I hope you enjoy the piece.

I talk about what it was like growing up as a bit of a black sheep in a strict family and what the concept of diversity means to me. If you’re looking for reading recommendations of the weird and wonderful ilk, you should definitely check it out. Plus, you also get to see what yours truly looked like when she was 18 and a newbie at Brunel University. Do leave a comment if you like the piece and give the others a good mooch too.

Next week, I’m going up to North Yorkshire to Pickering. I’ve been looking forward to it for weeks. I’m going to be staying with a lovely woman called Margaret, I’ve known for over twenty years. I visited her literally this time ten years ago and thought the area she lived in within Pickering was so beautiful that I couldn’t imagine anything bad happening to anyone who hailed from there. It was the perfect spot to base a certain family in Gunshot Glitter. If you’ve read Gunshot Glitter you’ll know who and why.

It’s going to be good to go back.

Enjoy your Indian Summer tomorrow, where ever you are, if it happens 😉

Love ❤ Yasmin xx

P.S. If you get the chance, go see Bend It Like Beckham – The Musical in the West End in London. It’s brilliant, I laughed and cried, I got excited when they said ‘Yeading’ and I got to see Jas Instrumentsfacia replicated on stage. And the woman sat to the left of my companion, Terence Dackombe, got so excited grooving in her seat, her shoe flew off! If that’s not a recommendation, I don’t know what is.